Brodie, who is 14 years old, was asked by his school to write a piece about what it means to have autism to help others understand his condition. We were so happy when he shared this with us too and agreed to us posting it here for you all to see as well. In his piece, Brodie encourages us to take some time to understand autism while sharing his own thoughts and experience of having autism. Please note the following blog post is a personal piece written by a guest blogger and does not necessarily represent the views of Scottish Autism. 

Autism is a difficult subject to discuss because nobody is completely sure about what it is and where it comes from. Autism is becoming a widespread problem worldwide, with at least 1/68 American children being autistic. The good thing is that people are becoming more aware of autism every day.

To clear something out of the way first, autism as a whole is not a mental disorder nor is it a learning disability. Autism is a neurological disorder. Mental disorders are things along the lines of schizophrenia. Learning disabilities are things like dyslexia or dysgraphia. In other words, autism is in a completely different category compared to these examples. Also, autism is not a disease; saying that autism is a disease is a downright insult.

So what is autism? Autism is defined as persistent deficits in social communication and interactions. The problem with the autistic spectrum is the people who lie within it are very unique and diverse. Wherever you lie on the spectrum you will be different from other people that are also on the same point.

Generally, autistic people may have the following symptoms:

• Difficulty with verbal/nonverbal communications, including problems using and understanding language, hand gestures, and facial expressions.
• Shows little interest in getting attention from others
• Able to talk a lot about a favourite topic but difficulty with talking about a range of topics
• Express few emotions/difficulty in reading other people’s facial expressions
• Little to no real friends
• Difficulty in relating to others their own age, and may prefer to socialise with younger or older people
• Sensitive to sensory experiences eg. Upset by certain sounds/loud noises.
• Repeated/unusual body movements
• Unusual attachment to objects eg. Coins or shoelaces

These are only a handful of symptoms, and they aren’t necessarily present in all autistic people. The severity of autistic spectrum symptoms can range from mild, to disabling. As I said before, every person that falls into the autistic spectrum is unique. One person may socialise with people older than them, and is upset by high-pitched noises. Another person might even be completely mute and carries a toy around. Another may only eat foods with a certain taste/texture, and could suffer from depression knowing that they are different from other people. Everybody’s different. You put two autistic people together and you’ll find more differences between them than you can put on one hand.

Sometimes I find that normal people treat autistic people as second-class citizens, maybe because of who they are and the way they think and act. It’s a bit like The Sneetches, a book by Dr. Seuss. The Sneetches tells the story of these bird-like creatures called Sneetches, who are divided into two groups: those who have stars on their bellies, and those who don’t. The ones without stars on their bellies are treated as second-class citizens because they’re not like the star-bellied Sneetches. They’re treated as second class citizens because they’re different.

The reason why I used The Sneetches as an analogy is because I find it to be similar with the situation we have here. An autistic person can still get onto a bus and sit down in a seat, but he wouldn’t be asked to move to another seatbecause he’s autistic. But people will still think negatively of him and criticise him because they know that he’s autistic; it’s a label with a negative aspect. I don’t blame these people because of the fact they think negatively of autistic people, it’s just in human nature to think differently of someone who is not the same as you. It’s something that we can’t change. The problem with autism is that some people seem to have tunnel vision and see every single person with autism as the same, and that isn’t true at all.

I believe that autism shouldn’t be treated as a label with a bad name. Autistic people are different, that’s true, but some have gone on to do great things, even changed the way we look and see the world. There are a lot of notable people who have autism/believed to have autism:

• Albert Einstein: Einstein most likely had a form of autism, and created one of the two pillars of modern physics, the general theory of relativity. He also helped in creating the other pillar, which is quantum mechanics. He is best known for the mass-energy equivalence formula E=mc^2.
• Charles Darwin: Charles Darwin often communicated via letters and was interested in chemistry and gadgets. He is best known for his contributions to evolutionary theory, a theory which states all species of life have descended over time from common ancestors.
• Thomas Jefferson: The third president of the United States and writer of the Declaration of Independence. He also invented the Jefferson wheel, a device used to encrypt messages.
• Stanley Kubrick: Renowned film director who produced famous hits such as 2001: A Space Odyssey, A Clockwork Orange, Dr. Strangelove, The Shining, and Full Metal Jacket.
• Friedrich Nietzsche: speculated to have Asperger’s syndrome, Nietzsche was a renowned philosopher. Also had a stone named after him. Works include Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Beyond Good and Evil, and The Gay Science.
• Alfred Hitchcock: Also speculated to have Asperger’s syndrome, Hitchcock was also a renowned director and producer. Also known as ‘The Master of Suspense’. Works include Psycho, The Birds, the film adaptation of Dial M for Murder, and also had his own television series, Alfred Hitchcock Presents.
• Daniel Tammet: Most likely an unknown name to some people, Tammet is an autistic savant, which he means he possesses fantastic talents. Tammet also has synaesthesia, which means he can smell numbers, and taste letters. For example, he says that the number 289 is particularly ugly, and that the number 9 is towering and intimidating. He also holds the European record for reciting pi from memory, clocking in at over 22,500 digits. Tammet knows tenlanguages and learned to speak conversational Icelandic in a week and was then interviewed by an Icelandic news channel. He also created a language known as Mänti, which uses some vocabulary and grammar from the Finnish language. 

As for me?

Sometimes I feel depressed knowing the fact that I’m different and sometimes have deep depressing thoughts. According to family members I have managed to minimalise most symptoms of autism, for example, I used to be really sensitive to noises and crowded places, but in recent years I feel that they don’t bother me as much. I find face-to-face conversations difficult, although I do try. Eye contact is something that I find difficult. I also have little to no friends, I only have around 2 friends, and 2 dogs. I might sound like I’m wallowing in self-pity, but I wish I had more friends and I also wish to be able to socialise better. More often than not I find myself really getting inside my mind and muting everything out, thinking about whatever pops up first. I would like to be treated as a normal person but I know for a fact that I’m not treated as normal. It’s extremely easy to look out for certain cues for when you know you’re being talked about in secret. People will usually turn their head to a friend and speak to them, or seem to ignore you. I find myself repeating something to someone when they seem like I don’t exist because they don’t do anything to show that they’re listening. When I say something to someone in the classroom or in the corridor, I find that there is some form of laughter or snicker in the background. I always feel like that laughter is aimed at me, and I always ask myself if I said something wrong. Of course, some people find me funny because I’m quick and have a dry sense of humour, although I think that sometimes people find me funny for the wrong reasons. I remember saying something in a funny accent a good few years ago, and got constantly bashed with the same old ‘say that thing in the funny accent’. I know for a fact that they wanted me to say it not because it was ‘funny’, but because of the fact that they were getting a rise out of me.

If there was ever a Hell on earth though, gym class would be that hell, because I’ve been asthmatic since birth, overweight, and not as fit as other people – and I can’t deny that I’m fat. In gym class, I wasn’t allowed to take my inhaler with me. People often said ‘You’re not asthmatic, you never use your inhaler!’ which I think is border-line bullying. Just because my lungs are impaired to yours doesn’t mean that I need to be on constant life support. The only sport related game I can play is chess, and that takes absolutely no stamina.

People definitely have their strengths and weakness, and when it comes to me I’m better suited to activities that don’t require a lot of physical strength. I mean, some people can’t even dream of writing an essay of about 1500+ words, but give me some sources and some time and sure, I could write that. It’s not surprising that my personality type is INTJ - Introversion, Intuition, Thinking, and Judgement - something which only 2% of people have.

So in conclusion, I am special. And that can go both ways.